Making the final software decision

Here is an easy process to follow to help you decide.

Steps:

1.  Gather all the information for each potential vendor and prepare a summary of the key criteria for each.

2.  Bring your project team together to jointly review the information, the summaries, discuss the pros and cons of each of the potential vendor solutions.

3.  Then, jointly rank each of the vendors against your key criteria.

Notes

(i)  Software functionality. Clearly the most important criteria, so focus on your key functional requirements and where the solution(s) from each vendor, differ from each other.

(ii)  Implementation. Even the best software will not work well, with a poor implementation. So you need to be very sure that you either have the skills, experience and resources on board, or can acquire these from the vendor, or other service providers, or by retraining existing employees.

(iii)  ROI (return on investment) / TCO (total costs of ownership). Re-check both calculations for 7 year time scale, for each vendor - as each vendor solution may have different benefits as well as different costs.

(iv)  Maintenance and support / SLA (Service Level Agreement). Be sure of what you are getting for your annual (or regular) payments, that it is appropriate and represents good value for money.

(v)  Software technology. Should be forward looking technology and either match that of your business or heading where you are heading. However, some forward looking technologies may be closer to where you are heading than others. (Solutions or vendors using old technology should have been removed at the RFI stage).

(vi)  The vendor. Their business strength, business and product direction, and how well you get on with the vendor are important. Equally, so is a process or arrangement to protect your investment in the software, should the vendor themselves be acquired or taken over by another organisation.

(vii)  In this example, we’ve included 6 key criteria for the project as a whole. You may have more criteria and may also wish to use some form of weighting and scoring rather than simple ranking. If so, amend your table accordingly.

Hidden costs of acquiring new software

It starts with the software vendor’s additional costs (after all they are in business to make money) and carries on throughout the implementation.

One solution is to identify the total cost of ownership, not just the software, as clearly as you can prior to acquisition. If you establish and compare the total costs associated with each software package for 1 year and 5 years from the date of acquisition, you will have a much better idea of what to expect. Fairly obviously, a low cost for software does not necessarily mean that it is the best overall value.

Another solution is to look out for potential hidden costs and either include them or a contingency, and then manage them as best as possible at the time they occur. To help, here is a (not exhaustive) list of such potential hidden costs:

The software application licence - the modules you really need, rather than what you would like to have (or be talked into), what the prices are based on - number of concurrent system users, number of employees or records (eg for Human Resources Software), number of transactions or a mix of these? What are the different price bands? How it will work out for your organisation?

Training costs – number of days and day rate. What is the typical amount of training required for the average customer and specifically, what would be required for your organisation? What is the cost of setting up a training facility on your site? Or to use the vendor’s facilities?

IT Project Proposal

The 2 main types of internal IT project proposal for replacing business systems, such as a CRM system are:

•    outline proposal for system selection and system replacement in principle – to obtain approval for limited funds to undertake the system selection process
•    detailed proposal to implement a replacement system – carried out at the end of the system selection process – to obtain approval for much larger funds to purchase software, hardware, consultancy, training and implement the chosen system

If your organisation has a defined internal project approval process or framework, you will have to closely follow it if you wish to obtain project approval. If there is no defined process, you will have greater choice as to what and how to include in a proposal. But this probably makes it harder, so consider the following points when preparing your IT project proposal:

Ensure you fully understand the business and end user needs for the project. If you have yet to prepare more than a ‘back of the envelope’ spec of requirements, these RFI/RFP Templates can help you to quickly and easily prepare your requirements specification, RFI and RFP. Make sure the business and user needs (requirements) are crystal-clear in the proposal.

Understand what the other key project drivers are eg cost containment, time scale, project quality. Once known, make sure you give this adequate emphasis within the proposal.

Next, consider the proposal recipients ie the executive management / board, what they are looking for, the information they require and what is important to them and the organisation. Then provide the information they require eg if they want details give them, if not don’t. If you are unsure what they want – find out, before preparing the proposal. Picture them going through your proposal with a checklist – does your proposal tick all the boxes?

RFI RFP Accounting Software

The Accounting RFI/RFP Template will:

Save you time identifying and gathering your new software / system requirements because thousands of carefully researched criteria are listed. Simply choose those you need and set priorities for each criteria. Then quickly prepare your RFI and RFP by just filling in the blanks. And as the templates are available in MS Excel / Word, you can quickly and easily amend to your precise needs.

Save you effort as you don’t have to start from scratch. The templates reduce the effort involved with specifying requirements and preparing RFI’s / RFP’s.

The standardised format also helps software vendors to more clearly understand your requirements and more easily respond to each requirement, using the space available within the template. So you will receive clearer and improved responses. And consequently, spend less time and effort evaluating and comparing vendor responses.

Save you money as you can use the template yourself. There’s no need for extra staff or resources to help you specify your requirements or prepare your RFI and RFP.

Reduce the risk of selecting the wrong Accounting System by providing clarity and transparency. You can see your requirements, easily evaluate and compare vendor responses and so identify the best solution(s) for your organisation.